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Crimes &amp; Criminals

Charles Davis writes The following article appeared in the November 2001 issue of American
Libraries, p. 32.

Arrest Made in Document Thefts

A University of Wisconsin/Madison student has been arrested on charges he stole signatures of
early American figures while he was working at a Yale University library over the summer.
Benjamin W. Johnson, 21, allegedly stole and sold about 70 documents bearing the signatures
of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and other historical figures.

British citizen Melvin Nelson Perry, 45, was given an 18-month prison sentence on Tuesday for stealing six valuable maps from the map collection of Finnish explorer A. E. Nordenskiöld from the library of the University of Helsinki in February this year. In spite of his prison sentence, Perry walked out of Helsinki District Court a free man, as he was not immediately ordered into custody. It is unlikely that he will ever have to serve his time unless he decides to come to Finland voluntarily.

Perry has not yet decided if he plans to appeal his sentence. He said that he would be willing to do community service, \"but not in a public library\", he added.

This from Japan reporting that the Tottori
Prefectural Library was found to have lost 6400
volumes since it opened in 1990. In recent months
several libraries have reported losses. They are
considering installing a Book Detection
System.

The Asahi Shimbun reports:
\"The prefecture\'s administrative surveillance team
was brought in, with the governor\'s strict orders to get to
the bottom of the matter. Governor Yoshihiro Katayama
apologized in public for his own ``supervisory
oversight,\'\' and served a written warning to the chief
librarian.\"

Always helpful Charles Davis passed along This Times UK Story
on several 400-year-old theology books that have disappeared from the Bodleian Library at Oxford, just days after thieves tried to
snatch precious watches, silver and gold from the university’s
neighbouring Ashmolean Museum.

The 17th-century books, worth about £20,000, had been
available to study on request and were not in display cases.
They think ten large volumes were smuggled out of the library, concealed in clothing.

A Gladstone, Missouri man found guilty of stealing some 58 books valued at about $800 has been forced to pay back $2,118 in damages and has been put on probation for one-year. He stole the books from a number of libraries and then attempted to sell them on E-Bay. Two online bidders contacted the library after purchasing the stolen books. More proof that crime doesn\'t pay, especially on E-Bay. [more...] from The Liberty Sun News.

Another story on thefts of CDs and DVDs from a public library. This time, the items were taken to a pawnshop and the suspicious shopowner notified police. The most amazing thing to me is that Timberland Regional Library allows users to check out up to 200 items at a time. Surely noone has that much free time?

The Guardian (UK) has this story on how Britain is becoming the
new centre for the illegal trafficking of rare books and
manuscripts, many of which have been stolen from European
libraries.
While they can\'t seem to keep the illegal stuff out, the
good stuff is getting away.
This story from The Independent on how British libraries
are not able to
compete with \"wealthy American libraries\" which are
offering big bucks to buy up the papers of famous modern
British authors including Ted Hughes, Martin Amis and Salman
Rushdie.
Now if someone will just point me at one of these wealthy
American libraries...

Bob Cox forwarded this along from Jimmy D. McKee, Director, Caldwell County Public Library\"
\"Colleagues, Just wanted to let you know that the lady we suspect of purloining our books has been nabbed according to our local detective who was working the case. She had more than 2,000 books some of which she claims were purchased at yard sales. The detective says that they did find records on her computer where items had been sold. Most of the books are being held by the Hickory Police department and the lead detective there, Danny Stewart, said that they would be inventorying the books and contacting the libraries involved to see about getting your materials back and to see if you want to file a warrant. We did get an editorial in our local paper this morning chiding us for checking out so many books to one individual. It is evident that most of our policies are directed toward the honest users of our libraries and perhaps this was a warning for all of us to reassess our policies and procedures in some areas. With relative ease this lady checked out close to $50,000 worth of materials!\"

Bob Cox forwarded this along with this warning: \"Granted this is North Carolina orientated, but these \'people\' have a habit
of crossing state borders.\"

\"Several libraries in our area, Alexander, Burke, Caldwell, Catawba, and Iredell so far, have probably been victimized by a book thief. She is very clever and evidently has had no trouble obtaining a library card in all these libraries as she presents identification. She has given the following names, April Bumgardner, Newyum, Hudson, Nelson, & Coleman so far. All the above libraries have overdue books checked out by this lady that unfortunately number more than 600 items so far. She used to work at a bookstore and it appears that many of these items are listed on her Internet site for sale.
More....